The Messenger (2011 reformat) Page 11

  Dhevic laughed in the lamplight. The single print could probably be sold to a private collector for a million dollars, yet here he was, in a $40-per-night St. Petersburg motel, eating Dollar Store baked beans cold out of a can.

  He knew he'd need more money; his benefactors always came through, if a little late sometimes. This fleabag was all he could afford. He could hear bickering through the door from time to time. Periodic muscle cars and rudely loud motorcycles tearing down the main drag made the night seem like it was exploding. In the next room, a bed frame could be heard thumping against the wall, an impatient female voice complaining, "Hurry up, man! Your half hour's up!"

  Yes, in times like these Dhevic could only laugh to himself at this strange plight he'd inherited. When he looked through the room's bent blinds, he saw a Denny's across the street, and a sign in the lit window: BREAKFAST SERVED ALL NIGHT!

  God, I wish I could have an omelet, he thought and laughed again. The beans weren't bad, actually, but after so many days?

  He smiled and closed the blinds.

  He didn't want to put on the television again-it would just be more of the same-but he switched it on regardless. He'd learned long ago, when he'd first started, never to be alarmed, or shocked. There was no point.

  It comes with the turf, he thought.

  Besides, he'd seen far, far worse.

  The bed creaked when he sat on it. The television screen came alive.

  The Channel 9 newswoman stood in front of the school, hairspray stiff blond hair wilting in the humidity. She was clearly on edge as she recited the events.

  "... the second inexplicable tragedy to strike the quiet town of Danelleton in just three days, both involving postal employees..."

  The screen snapped to a employee-file photograph of...

  "...Longtime postal supervisor Carlton Spence allegedly went on a rampage today at the Seaton School for Christian Girls, murdering a nun, a dorm assistant, and six students before taking his own life when local police arrived at the school's dormitory building..."

  The shot cut back to the disheartened newswoman, her voice droning. In the background, police and paramedics rushed in and out of the dormitory's pillared entranceway.

  This shocking second mass murder of the week brings Danelleton's death toll to thirty-eight."

  The words faded out in Dhevic's head. He'd seen it before-and wasn't surprised. He knew full well that it was happening again.

  He nodded off on the bed, still fully clothed. His dreams were awful, they often were, because they typically replayed what he'd witnessed in his visions. Horrors stacked upon horrors stacked upon horrors in a place where time did not really exist. Seconds ticked by in twinges of agony, minutes ticked by in screams. Hours ticked by in atrocities designed to exist without purpose, for their own sake. It was not understandable. Not by humans.

  The human mind could not reckon, it could not grasp this timeless war. We're just too stupid, too simple and unsophisticated, he thought.

  Some things aren't meant to be known.

  That would have to suffice.

  He sat up on the bed, rubbed his eyes. Then he got up, stepping over a cockroach, and went to the bathroom. He washed his face in the stained sink, as if that might wash away the atrocities of his dreams and visions. He felt tainted, contaminated by these truths revealed to so few.

  But he never lost his faith.

  A click in his head; he glanced up quickly, spied his face in the mirror and saw water dripping off his beard. He looked like Rasputin, sopping wet as when his body was pulled from the West Dniva River. The familiar yet always strange noise creaked in his head, like a bad hinge, then a quiet bonelike snap!

  He could see them out there.

  Dhevic sighed. He was a tall man but not physically strong. He had no weapons. But he needed the vehicle that his benefactors provided. I'll call the police, the truck will be gone or stripped by the time they get here.

  And it's a damn nice truck!

  He had but one recourse. Confront them.

  I'm a recipient augur, not a tough guy. He toweled off his face, put on his black jacket, and opened the motel room door.

  Punks was the only word to describe them. Dhevic knew their plight: abused, terrifying domestic environments as infants and children, poverty, and just plain evil influence. But they were still punks. They were intently clothes-hangering Dhevic's brand-new silver Ford Explorer.

  Late teens, Dhevic could see. One black, one white. Buzz cuts and lip rings. Baggy long pants, waistbands of their briefs showing, sneakers untied. Dhevic didn't get the style. Neither wore shirts, and both had an array of tattoos.

  "Please. Stop that. Go away. I need that vehicle more than you can know."

  Both kids glared up, not even momentarily taken aback by Dhevic's height.

  "Fuck off, man. We'll kill ya," the black one said.

  The white one pulled a small pistol.

  "Let's kill the fucker anyway..."

  They laughed, White Kid keeping the gun on Dhevic, Black Kid clothes-hangering the Explorer's door. "Fuck this shit, man," the black said, arrogantly eyeing Dhevic. "Gimme the keys."

  Dhevic could smell what they were both thinking: Now that he'd seen them, they'd have to kill him, to prevent their description from being given to the police. They'll put me in the truck at gunpoint, make me drive, then kill me on some back road.

  "Keys, man," White Kid insisted. "Now."

  "No," Dhevic said. "Just go away."

  The punks exchanged incredulous glances. "Man, what is wrong with people? Can you believe it?"

  "Fuckin' Acan't."

  "Hey, buddy? Hey, beard?" White Punk aimed the pistol straight at Dhevic's face. "You listenin' to me, mother fucker? You gimme those keys right now or I cap your ass."

  Dhevic stood there perfectly still, eyes wide. "Look," was all he said.

  White Kid was staring back now, right into Dhevic's eyes.

  "Do you see?" Dhevic asked him quietly. "Look closely."

  The kid's expression collapsed. The gun lowered and he fell to his knees. But he could not take his gaze off Dhevic's eyes.

  "Do you see her?" Dhevic asked. He stepped closer, wielding his stare like a weapon itself. "I can. She's waving to you, isn't she? Here, I'll show you more."

  "No!" the kid shouted. Tears poured down his face. "Don't make me see any more!" He slid the pistol to Dhevic's feet. A trembling hand reached into his pocket and threw Dhevic a wad of cash. Then he brought his face to his hands and cried outright.

  "The heck you doin'?" Black Kid yelled.

  "I-I-I just saw my mother."

  "The fuck you just say?"

  "He made me see my mother!" White Kid wept.

  "What the shit you talkin' about, man? Your mother's dead."

  "No," Dhevic corrected. "She's very much alive. Someplace else. Forever."

  Hitching sobs and gagging, the white kid literally crawled away on his hands and knees.

  Black Kid's gaze whipped back and forth, between Dhevic and his comrade. His expression kept forming and re-forming, the best he could do to mask his fear and confusion. He looked back at Dhevic, who seemed much more formidable now, and his hands patted his pockets in frustration.

  "No weapons now?" Dhevic's voice grated. At his feet lay the pistol; he kicked it over to the black kid. "Before you pick it up, though ... look."

  The kid's defiant stare began to tremble. Dhevic stepped forward once, twice, baring his gaze down into his opponent's face. "And what of you? Would you like to see your sister?"

  Their stares locked.

  "Her name is-what? Jerrica? Erika? Something like that? Look. In my eyes. Look and you'll see her." His voice ground down like gravel rubbing. "Look and see what they're doing to her."

  The kid's mouth fell open, lips quivering. It appeared that what he saw was making his eyes quiver, too. "No more, no more," he murmured.

  "It was you who hooked Erika up with the stoners" Dhevic said. He said it b
ecause he knew it. He knew nothing but everything. "It was part of some deal, wasn't it? Some kind of gang initiation. Well, that's what she's doing now. She'll die soon, too, and be in the same place as your friend's mother-but that doesn't matter. Look. Look."

  "No. God. Please."

  "And now Twanna," Dhevic said. "Your first girlfriend, right? Right now, she is in the same place as your friend's mother. You indoctrinated her...very effectively. Look. Look at her now."

  The kid fell to his knees and vomited. Like the other kid, he began to sob from the impact of the catastrophic vision.

  "Those things eating her are called dentatapeds, a species of cacodemon from the Lower Orders. They eat her alive and regurgitate her every night, and then start again the next night. It's part of the entertainment for the Court of Grand Duke de Rais. The entire court rapes her first, of course. Twanna is immortal now. This is how she will spend eternity. Here, let me show you your brother."

  "NO!" The kid teetered on his knees like a svelte tree in high wind. Eyes bugging, he snatched the gun up from the pavement and put it to his head.

  "Don't do that," Dhevic said very calmly. "What you have to understand is that you still have a chance, and so does your friend. Keep it all in mind, along with everything you've seen tonight." Then Dhevic gave the kid a selfless smile. "Who knows what the future holds?"

  The kid dropped the gun, stood up in his shock. Like the other one, he fumbled in his pocket and threw some cash toward Dhevic. "Please. No more."

  "Go. Go find your friend and tell him this: 'O send out your light and your truth. Let them lead me.'"

  The kid sobbed as he staggered away.

  Dhevic sighed in relief. This is wearing me out, he thought with a laugh. He looked up and down the motel front; no one had seen the bizarre confrontation. He quickly pocketed the pistol, then scooped the cash off the ground.

  This is a fair shake of cash!, he thought.

  Then he thought: Yep. God works in mysterious ways.

  He stuffed the money in his jacket pocket and walked across the main drag, to treat himself to an omelet at Denny's.

  Chapter Nine

  I

  The night turned sedate, the moon hanging large and low. A comfortable breeze flowed off the bay to knock down some of the mugginess. Crickets could be heard, their chorus making the evening seem to throb. Jane felt tranquilized.

  But still at odds with so many things, so much she didn't understand.

  She sat out on the back porch, protected from mosquitoes. She let herself be lost in her thoughts, however confusing they may have been. The night breeze sifted through the screens, lifted her hair. She was trying to feel as good as she could under the circumstances.

  She'd already checked on the kids; both Kevin and Jennifer were sound asleep, relieved that her fainting spell hadn't been serious. She'd checked all the outside doors, made sure they were locked. When her thoughts turned to the calamities of the past few days, she blocked them out.

  All but one. What Steve had been saying earlier, just before he'd left. Who else out there is in the cult too?

  Could it really be a cult? It made too much sense when Steve had been discussing it, but now? The day done, the kids asleep, the doors locked? I just don't think I can believe it, she thought. Not in an area like this. Not in Danelleton. There were no satanic cults, no ritual murderers in league with one another, like some integrated but very discreet cell of terrorists.

  I should just go to bed, she told herself, but when she began to do that, a laziness kept her in the porch chair. It was too tranquil right now, too peaceful and serene. She loved the night breeze against her face, and the feel of the weatherproof carpet against her toes. I could just fall asleep right out here, she realized, and then a stiffer breeze

  blew in, rustling the backyard trees. It billowed her nightgown, slipped coolly down her warm skin. It felt-again-serene. It made her feel like the night.

  What she didn't know was that the night was coming for her.

  II

  The night was his blood. He took it and lived on it. Technically, this would be called simple sub-corporeal channeling. Not so technically: walking-around time for a disembodied spirit. The Messenger liked to slip about at night. He liked to see people, to see what they were doing. He liked, too, to get right behind them and puppet them, ooze into their minds until they were essentially one.

  He glided on shadows. He stomped through brushes and brambles but made no sound. Now he was moving around the house, like a shadow himself, like a shadow moving in car lights.

  What is in here? he wondered.

  He stopped and looked into a window, saw a sleeping child, a young boy. The Messenger wanted to slip into the boy's head and spoil his dreams, make him wake screaming.

  But not tonight.

  I must control myself.

  In the next window, a girl lay asleep, older than the boy. This roused the Messenger. She would be sweet to terrify, to corrupt, to destroy. Innocence was the problem, though, one of the Messenger's few barriers. He could not machinate her. He knew that if he genuinely exerted himself, he could send her dreaming visions into a tumult, he could drop them right off the precipice into the most foul canyon of the netherworld. He could pollute her dreams to the extent that she would never forget them, never recover. She'd be tainted for life.

  Yes, it would be sweet.

  But...not...tonight.

  The Messenger smelled something better, just around the corner.

  His blood surged from the smell. He was smelling sweet dreams that lay ripe for ruin. He smelled a woman, a robust woman.

  In the back. Trees shivered in wind. Moonlight lay flat on new-mown grass. The Messenger's steps left blackened footprints from which tendrils of noxious smoke rose.

  He was looking through a screen.

  At her. At Jane. Oh, yes. Much fodder there. So much meat for my gullet.

  Bare tan legs sprawled off the slatted chair. The Messenger wanted to lick them all the way up to her fresh sex, his black tongue leaving a sheen of putrid slime. Her breasts gently rose and fell beneath the semitransparent nightgown. The Messenger wanted to knead them and suck them out. Then he would mount her in the hot muck of his domain and just have her, spend himself in her, and then give her to his mascots.

  Maybe that will happen sometime, he hoped. Who could tell? He hoped that life in this place would bring her down-to eternal life in his place. Then he would have her for his whimsy. Until then, he'd have to be patient, for she wasn't soiled enough.

  He could machinate her, though. The temptation was overwhelming. His hideous hand reached through the screen, like smoke, and swept through her head. He was killing her dreams at once, showing her the delicious horrors of his own abode-an anticipation, perhaps. An invitation. Would she accept?

  Probably not. Her heart was still strong, her resolve still too pure.

  I can do this, though, he thought, chuckling.

  She quivered in the chair, the nightmares he'd bidden infecting her like a virus. When he ran his bodiless hand down her breasts, he felt nothing, but when he placed it over her own hand, they fused together. Now he moved her hand to her breasts and felt the warm, moist skin himself, plucked a nipple hard enough to make her flinch in her sleep. He moved her hand down to her hips next, pulled up the hem of the nightgown, then plied her sex, fingers smoothing over the downy private hair.

  He raised his hand to her throat and watched her hand do the same. He squeezed and her fingers constricted. She began to pant and shiver.

  I could make you walk into your son's room and eviscerate yourself while he watched. I could make you walk into your daughter's room and snap her neck.

  But not tonight.

  Patience was a virtue, and so was prudence.

  The Messenger was tired. He knew he must conserve his strength. Besides, there was easier fodder out there. The easy ones were always the most fun.

  When he slipped away, the woman named Jane took her h
and from her own throat and went lax, gasping. The Messenger was going away now, into some other fissure of the night. But as he passed another window, something caught his orblike eye. A glass box, with some sort of tiny creature in it. A toad.

  The Messenger smiled.

  The boy's pet, of course.

  The Messenger looked at the toad and killed it with one phantasmal sigh, and then he was off, away with the breeze and the cricket trills and the night.

  Yes. He was off for easier fodder.

  Annabelle felt afire, her silken cinnamon hair dancing in the moonlight, which poured in from the bedroom window. A shining, naked whirlwind of flesh and sensation and pure, raw desire. Her hands opened flat against her husband's heaving chest; her hips squirmed over his, coltish legs clenching. She was riding him as though he were one of the horses of the apocalypse.

  Her husband's name was Mark, a good decent man who focused on his wife as his chief priority. He worked for a defense contractor, the presentation director, and he'd be flying to California in the morning, would be away for a week. Annabelle saw it as her own priority, then, to see that he had a memorable send-off.

  The Messenger did too.

  And as for Annabelle, she was beginning to understand now, that weird flux that she'd felt in her head for a while: her own conscience melting into someone else's. She wasn't herself anymore-she was more than herself. She was two, her desires mingling, her nerves being borrowed, for an ultimate coalescence.

  You are part of me, and I am part of you, she heard the words bubble in her ears.

  Not her words.

  Annabelle smiled.

  Her nails were all but digging into Mark's chest, his own hands sliding in sweat over the curves of her rump and back. His face looked contorted as he staved off his release, grinding his teeth so as not to climax too fast. All the while, Annabelle bucked and bucked as the Messenger's shadow form manipulated her from behind. It was too easy.

  "Baby, oh God," Mark panted. "You're...just...the best."

  Oh, we know, came the shared thought in response.